News
Bob Shallit: Promos possess a different flavor
By Bob Shallit - bshallit@sacbee.com
Forget about Yosemite, Disneyland and the Golden Gate Bridge.
In growing numbers, tourists are coming to California to visit … the French Laundry restaurant, the Kuleto Estate Winery, the Fiscalini Cheese Co. and other gastronomic wonders.
At least that's the basis of an ad campaign launched this month by Sacramento's MeringCarson ad agency on behalf of the state's Travel and Tourism Commission and the Wine Institute.
The $2 million campaign includes ads in gourmet mags, a new Web site (www. landofwineandfood.com) and a cable TV spot featuring chefs and vintners hailing California as "the land of wine and food."
Ad agency chief Dave Mering says the campaign's message emerged from research on why people visit California. In the past, he says, people picked a travel destination, then looked up nearby restaurants and wineries to visit.
Now, for an increasing number of "foodies," it's the other way around, with folks identifying culinary hot spots, "then plan their travel around that."
"We know it's a huge vacation driver," he says of the state's reputation as a food and wine mecca.
The magazine ads, running in affluent publications such as Bon Appetit and Wine Spectator, feature a trio of vintners and makers of gourmet foodstuffs. One, showing a cluster of Modesto cheesemakers emerging from a mouse hole into a room filled with gigantic chunks of cheese, "might be one of the best ads we've ever done," Mering says.
The TV spot mimics previous MeringCarson spots for California tourism that featured sports celebrities and movie stars such as Clint Eastwood talking up the state's attractions.
The new ad utilizes Californians – such as chef Thomas Keller of the French Laundry and Napa Valley winemaker Heidi Barrett – whom non-foodies may not recognize.
That's OK, Mering says. The food-oriented traveler targeted by the spots will know those chefs and winemakers, he says. To everyone else, "they come across as real people telling their story," he says.
Few will have trouble identifying the couple at the ad's conclusion, seen enjoying a glass of wine in a restaurant. The pair appear far more polished than the rest.
That's understandable. California's governor and first lady, says Mering, "know what they're doing in front of a camera."